Cleromancy is a form ofsortition (casting oflots) in which an outcome is determined by means that normally would be consideredrandom, such as the rolling ofdice (astragalomancy), but that are sometimes believed to reveal the will of a deity.
Inancient Rome, fortunes were told through the casting of lots orsortes.[1]
.jpg)
Casting of lots (Hebrew:גּוֹרָל,romanized: gōral,Greek:κλῆρος,romanized: klē̂ros) is mentioned 47 times in theBible.[citation needed] Some examples in theHebrew Bible of the casting of lots as a means of determiningGod's will:
Other places in the Hebrew Bible relevant to divination include:
A notable example in theNew Testament occurs in theActs of the Apostles1:23–26 where the eleven remainingapostles cast lots to determine whether to selectMatthias, orBarsabbas (surnamed Justus) to replaceJudas.[citation needed]
TheEastern Orthodox Church still occasionally uses this method of selection. In 1917,MetropolitanTikhon becamePatriarch of Moscow by the drawing of lots. TheCoptic Orthodox Church uses drawing lots to choose theCoptic pope, most recently done in November 2012 to choosePope Tawadros II. GermanPietist Christians in the 18th century often followed the New Testament precedent of drawing lots to determine the will of God. They often[quantify] did so by selecting a random Bible passage. The most extensive use of drawing of lots in the Pietist tradition may have come with Count vonZinzendorf and theMoravian Brethren ofHerrnhut, who drew lots for many purposes, including selection of church sites, approval of missionaries, the election of bishops, and many others. This practice was greatly curtailed after the General Synod of the worldwide Moravian Unity in 1818[citation needed] and finally discontinued in the 1880s. ManyAmish customarily select ordinary preachers by lot. (Note that the Greek word for "lot" (kleros) serves as the etymological root for English words like "cleric" and "clergy" as well as for "cleromancy".)[4]
Tacitus, in Chapter X of hisGermania (circa 98 AD), describes casting lots as a practice used by the Germanic tribes. He states:[5]
To divination and casting of lots, they pay attention beyond any other people. Their method of casting lots is a simple one: they cut a branch from a fruit-bearing tree and divide it into small pieces which they mark with certain distinctive signs and scatter at random onto a white cloth. Then, the priest of the community if the lots are consulted publicly, or the father of the family if it is done privately, after invoking the gods and with eyes raised to heaven, picks up three pieces, one at a time, and interprets them according to the signs previously marked upon them.
In the ninth centuryAnskar, a Frankish missionary and laterbishop of Hamburg-Bremen, observed the same practice several times in the decision-making process of the Danish peoples. In this version, the chips were believed to determine the support or otherwise of gods, whether Christian or Norse, for a course of action or act. For example, in one case a Swedish man feared he had offended a god and asked a soothsayer to cast lots to find out which god. The soothsayer determined that the Christian god had taken offence; the Swede later found a book that his son had stolen from Bishop Gautbert in his house.[6]
 | This sectiondoes notcite anysources. Please helpimprove this section byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged andremoved.(October 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Inancient China, and especially inChinese folk religion, various means of divination through random means are employed, such asqiúqiān (求簽). InJapan,omikuji is one form of drawing lots.
I Ching divination, which dates from early China, has played a major role in Chinese culture and philosophy for more than two thousand years. The I Ching tradition descended in part from theoracle bone divination system that was used by rulers in theShang dynasty, and grew over time into a rich literary wisdom tradition that was closely tied to the philosophy ofyin and yang. I Ching practice is widespread throughout East Asia, and commonly involves the use of coins or (traditionally) sticks ofyarrow.
In SouthIndia, the custom of ritualistically tossing sea shells (sozhi) and interpreting the results based on the positions of the shells is prevalent, predominantly in the state ofKerala.
| This sectiondoes notcite anysources. Please helpimprove this section byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged andremoved.(October 2024) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
InYoruba and Yoruba-inspired religions,babalawos use variations on a common type of cleromancy calledIfá divination. Ifá divination is performed by "pounding ikin"—transferring consecrated oil palm kernels from one hand to another to create a pattern of eight to sixteen marks called "Odù" onto a tray ofiyerosun, or consecrated termite dust from the Irosun tree. The casting itself is calledDafá inYoruba language speaking areas in West Africa. Similar toI Ching, this form of divination forms a binary-like series of eight broken or unbroken pairs. This allows for 256 combinations, each of which references sets of tonal poems that contain a structure that includes various issues, problems and adversities and the prescriptions of offerings to correct them.
The game of Waltes is a form of cleromancy practiced by traditionalMi'kmaq and preserved since colonial potlache law, the Indian Act and residential schools in Canada. It is played with a bowl, six bone dice, and a counting stick. Three sticks are grandmothers and one the grandfather.[7]
